Estimators of the regression parameters of the zeta distribution

The zeta distribution with regression parameters has been rarely used in statistics because of the difficulty of estimating the parameters by traditional maximum likelihood. We propose an alternative method for estimating the parameters based on an iteratively reweighted least-squares algorithm. The quadratic distance estimator (QDE) obtained is consistent, asymptotically unbiased and normally distributed; the estimate can also serve as the initial value required by an algorithm to maximize the likelihood function. We illustrate the method with a numerical example from the insurance literature; we compare the values of the estimates obtained by the quadratic distance and maximum likelihood methods and their approximate variance–covariance matrix. Finally, we calculate the bias, variance and the asymptotic efficiency of the QDE compared to the maximum likelihood estimator (MLE) for some values of the parameters.     

Estimation of the entropy of a multivariate normal distribution

Motivated by problems in molecular biosciences wherein the evaluation of entropy of a molecular system is important for understanding its thermodynamic properties, we consider the efficient estimation of entropy of a multivariate normal distribution having unknown mean vector and covariance matrix. Based on a random sample, we discuss the problem of estimating the entropy under the quadratic loss function. The best affine equivariant estimator is obtained and, interestingly, it also turns out to be an unbiased estimator and a generalized Bayes estimator. It is established that the best affine equivariant estimator is admissible in the class of estimators that depend on the determinant of the sample covariance matrix alone. The risk improvements of the best affine equivariant estimator over the maximum likelihood estimator (an estimator commonly used in molecular sciences) are obtained numerically and are found to be substantial in higher dimensions, which is commonly the case for atomic coordinates in macromolecules such as proteins. We further establish that even the best affine equivariant estimator is inadmissible and obtain Stein-type and Brewster–Zidek-type estimators dominating it. The Brewster–Zidek-type estimator is shown to be generalized Bayes.     

Asymptotic properties of conditional maximum likelihood estimator in a certain exponential model

The conditional maximum likelihood estimator is suggested as an alternative to the maximum likelihood estimator and is favorable for an estimator of a dispersion parameter in the normal distribution, the inverse-Gaussian distribution, and so on. However, it is not clear whether the conditional maximum likelihood estimator is asymptotically efficient in general. Consider the case where it is asymptotically efficient and its asymptotic covariance depends only on an objective parameter in an exponential model. This remand implies that the exponential model possesses a certain parallel foliation. In this situation, this paper investigates asymptotic properties of the conditional maximum likelihood estimator and compares the conditional maximum likelihood estimator with the maximum likelihood estimator. We see that the bias of the former is more robust than that of the latter and that two estimators are very close, especially in the sense of bias-corrected version. The mean Pythagorean relation is also discussed.     

The Maximum Lq-Likelihood Method: An Application to Extreme Quantile Estimation in Finance

Estimating financial risk is a critical issue for banks and insurance companies. Recently, quantile estimation based on extreme value theory (EVT) has found a successful domain of application in such a context, outperforming other methods. Given a parametric model provided by EVT, a natural approach is maximum likelihood estimation. Although the resulting estimator is asymptotically efficient, often the number of observations available to estimate the parameters of the EVT models is too small to make the large sample property trustworthy. In this paper, we study a new estimator of the parameters, the maximum Lq-likelihood estimator (MLqE), introduced by Ferrari and Yang (Estimation of tail probability via the maximum Lq-likelihood method, Technical Report 659, School of Statistics, University of Minnesota, 2007 ). We show that the MLqE outperforms the standard MLE, when estimating tail probabilities and quantiles of the generalized extreme value (GEV) and the generalized Pareto (GP) distributions. First, we assess the relative efficiency between the MLqE and the MLE for various sample sizes, using Monte Carlo simulations. Second, we analyze the performance of the MLqE for extreme quantile estimation using real-world financial data. The MLqE is characterized by a distortion parameter q and extends the traditional log-likelihood maximization procedure. When q→1, the new estimator approaches the traditional maximum likelihood estimator (MLE), recovering its desirable asymptotic properties; when q ≠ 1 and the sample size is moderate or small, the MLqE successfully trades bias for variance, resulting in an overall gain in terms of accuracy (mean squared error).      

Component risk in multiparameter estimation

Summary For estimating the mean of ap-variate normal distribution under a quadratic loss, a class of estimators, known as Stein's estimators, is known to dominate the maximum likelihood estimator (MLE) forp≧3. But, whereas the risk of the MLE has the same value, equal to a constant, for each component, the maximum component risk of Stein's estimator is large for large values ofp. Certain modification of Stein's rule has been proposed in the literature for reducing the maximum component risk. In this paper, a new rule is given for reducing the maximum component risk. The new rule yields larger reduction in the maximum component risk, compared to its competitor.     

混合von Mises 模型的参数估计

有限混合von Mises模型在天文学、生物学、地理和医药等许多领域都有重要的应用．可是,不论样本量有多大,此模型的似然函数都是无界的．因此,参数的最大似然估计(MLE)是不相合的．我们发现,与混合正态模型一样,上述困难可以通过引入关于分布浓度参数的一个惩罚函数或对参数空间添加适当的约束来克服．在此文中,我们从理论上证明了这两种方法是可行的,相应的参数估计是强相合的,且是渐近有效的．我们还通过计算机模拟来探讨这些新方法在有限样本情况下的统计性质,并与现有的矩估计作了比较．结果发现,惩罚极大似然估计在均方误差方面表现最佳．最后我们还分析了一组实际数据,以进一步介绍新的估计方法．     

Efficiency of profile likelihood in semi-parametric models

Profile likelihood is a popular method of estimation in the presence of an infinite-dimensional nuisance parameter, as the method reduces the infinite-dimensional estimation problem to a finite-dimensional one. In this paper we investigate the efficiency of a semi-parametric maximum likelihood estimator based on the profile likelihood. By introducing a new parametrization, we improve on the seminal work of Murphy and van der Vaart (J Am Stat Assoc, 95: 449–485, 2000): our improvement establishes the efficiency of the estimator through the direct quadratic expansion of the profile likelihood, which requires fewer assumptions. To illustrate the method an application to two-phase outcome-dependent sampling design is given.     

Generalized variance estimators in the multivariate gamma models

It is already known that the uniformly minimum variance unbiased (UMVU) estimator of the generalized variance always exists for any natural exponential family. However, in practice, this estimator is often difficult to obtain. This paper provides explicit forms of the UMVU estimators for the bivariate and symmetric multivariate gamma models, which are diagonal quadratic exponential families. For the non-independent multivariate gamma models, it is shown that the UMVU and the maximum likelihood estimators are not proportional.      

The maximum likelihood estimators in a multivariate normal distribution with AR(1) covariance structure for monotone data

The maximum likelihood estimators are uniquely obtained in a multivariate normal distribution with AR(1) covariance structure for monotone data. The maximum likelihood estimator of mean is unbiased.     

Parametric estimation of discretely sampled Gamma-OU processes

The stationary Gamma-OU processes are recommended to be the volatility of the financial assets. A parametric estimation for the Gamma-OU processes based on the discrete observations is considered in this paper. The estimator of an intensity parameter A and its convergence result are given, and the simulations show that the estimation is quite accurate. Assuming that the parameter A is estimated, the maximum likelihood estimation of shape parameter c and scale parameter a, whose likelihood function is not explicitly computable, is considered. By means of the Gaver-Stehfest algorithm, we construct an explicit sequence of approximations to the likelihood function and show that it converges the true (but unkown) one. Maximizing the sequence results in an estimator that converges to the true maximum likelihood estimator and the approximation shares the asymptotic properties of the true maximum likelihood estimator. Some simulation experiments reveal that this method is still quite accurate in most of rational situations for the background of volatility.     

指数分布抽样基本定理及在三参数一般指数分布参数估计中的应用

讨论三参数一般指数分布的参数估计,首先讨论了三参数一般指数分布参数的最大似然估计的求解问题,当其中参数α=1时,应用指数分布抽样基本定理,得到了三参数一般指数分布其它参数的一致最小方差无偏估计;并且由此给出求解三参数一般指数分布参数最大似然估计的迭代方法,得到了三参数一般指数分布参数最大似然估计的近似值,给出了模拟结果以说明迭代方法的收敛性;并以相关文献的观察数据作为样本,得到了三参数一般指数分布的参数估计,从而说明了迭代方法的有效性.     

Maximum integrated likelihood estimator of the interest parameter when the nuisance parameter is location or scale

The problem of estimation of an interest parameter in the presence of a nuisance parameter, which is either location or scale, is studied. Two estimators are considered: the usual maximum likelihood estimator and the estimator based on maximization of the integrated likelihood function. The estimators are compared, asymptotically, with respect to the bias and with respect to the mean squared error. The examples are given.     

UMVU estimation of the ratio of powers of normal generalized variances under correlation

We consider estimation of the ratio of arbitrary powers of two normal generalized variances based on two correlated random samples. First, the result of Iliopoulos [Decision theoretic estimation of the ratio of variances in a bivariate normal distribution, Ann. Inst. Statist. Math. 53 (2001) 436-446] on UMVU estimation of the ratio of variances in a bivariate normal distribution is extended to the case of the ratio of any powers of the two variances. Motivated by these estimators’ forms we derive the UMVU estimator in the multivariate case. We show that it is proportional to the ratio of the corresponding powers of the two sample generalized variances multiplied by a function of the sample canonical correlations. The mean squared errors of the derived UMVU estimator and the maximum likelihood estimator are compared via simulation for some special cases.     

Synoptic airflow and UK daily precipitation extremes

We develop a vector generalised linear model to describe the influence of the atmospheric circulation on extreme daily precipitation across the UK. The atmospheric circulation is represented by three covariates, namely synoptic scale airflow strength, direction and vorticity; the extremes are represented by the monthly maxima of daily precipitation, modelled by the generalised extreme value distribution (GEV). The model parameters for data from 689 rain gauges across the UK are estimated using a maximum likelihood estimator. Within the framework of vector generalised linear models, various plausible models exist to describe the influence of the individual covariates, possible nonlinearities in the covariates and seasonality. We selected the final model based on the Akaike information criterion (AIC), and evaluated the predictive power of individual covariates by means of quantile verification scores and leave-one-out cross validation. The final model conditions the location and scale parameter of the GEV on all three covariates; the shape parameter is modelled as a constant. The relationships between strength and vorticity on the one hand, and the GEV location and scale parameters on the other hand are modelled as natural cubic splines with two degrees of freedom. The influence of direction is parameterised as a sine with amplitude and phase. The final model has a common parameterisation for the whole year. Seasonality is partly captured by the covariates themselves, but mostly by an additional annual cycle that is parameterised as a phase-shifted sine and accounts for physical influences that we have not attempted to explicitly model, such as humidity.     

Possible superiority of the conditional MLE over the unconditional MLE

The possibility that the conditional maximum likelihood estimator (CMLE) is superior to the unconditional maximum likelihood estimator (UMLE) is discussed in examples where the residual likelihood is obstructive. We observe relatively smaller risks of the CMLE for a finite sample size. The models in the study include the normal, inverse Gauss, gamma, two-parameter exponential, logit, negative binomial and two-parameter geometric ones.     

The maximum full and partial likelihood estimators in the proportional hazard model

Summary The maximum full likelihood estimator in the proportional hazard model is explored in relation to the maximum partial likelihood estimator. In the scalar parameter case both the estimators have a common sign, and the absolute value of the former is strictly greater than that of the latter except for trivial cases. We point out also that the maximum full likelihood estimator after a simple modification of the likelihood equation provides a good approximation to the maximum partial likelihood estimator. Similar results are valid for the likelihood ratio tests. The Institute of Statistical Mathematics     

Shrinkage estimator in normal mean vector estimation based on conditional maximum likelihood estimators

Estimation of normal mean vector has broad applications such as small area estimation, estimation of nonparametric functions and estimation of wavelet coefficients. In this paper, we propose a new shrinkage estimator based on conditional maximum likelihood estimator incorporating with Stein’s risk unbiased estimator (SURE) when data have the normality. We present some theoretical work and provide numerical studies to compare with some existing methods.     

正态条件下带AR(1)-型方差结构GMANOVA-MANOVA模型极大似然估计的小样本特征

研究了一类带一阶自回归(AR(1))-型方差结构的广义多元方差分析-多元方差分析(GMANO VA-MANOVA)模型参数极大似然估计的小样本特征.对带AR(1)-型方差结构GMANOVA-MANOVA模型,文章在正态条件下给出了参数极大似然估计存在的一个充分必要条件,讨论了极大似然估计唯一的充分条件.在该充分条件下,文章证明了相关系数极大似然估计的精确分布只与相关系数有关,并依此给出了自相关系数简单假设H0:ρ=0v.s.H1:ρ≠0的一个不需要叠代计算估计的检验,同时模拟表明该检验为无偏检验且势函数与似然比检验势函数无太大差异.     

广义自回归模型参数的收缩估计

运用经典方法结合参数的先验信息得到了广义一阶自回归模型中自相关系数的收缩估计的闭式表达式,它是通常极大似然估计与先验均值的加权平均,在适当的先验信息下优于原来的估计.     

Estimating a model through the conditional MLE

The estimation problem of a model through the conditional maximum likelihood estimator (MLE) is explored. The estimated model is compared using the two dual Kullback-Leibler losses with that through the unconditional MLE. The former is found to be superior to the latter under familiar models. This result is applicable to the model selection problem. These suggest a novel extensive use of the conditional likelihood, since the traditional use of the conditional likelihood was restricted only on inference for the structural parameter.